Location: Melbourne, Australia
Passenger movement monitored by Metro
bevans
Site Admin
Location: Melbourne, Australia
route14
Chief Commissioner
I believe this is a positive step towards combating anti-social behavour especially harassment and random attacks.
bevans
Site Admin
Location: Melbourne, Australia
I believe this is a positive step towards combating anti-social behavour especially harassment and random attacks.
OK
historian
Chief Commissioner
I believe this is a positive step towards combating anti-social behavour especially harassment and random attacks.
Exactly how?
It reads like an AI technique. It's trained to recognise objects in level crossings when the protection equipment is operating, or objects crossing over the yellow line on platforms. Neither is particularly difficult for a specific location, although the generalisation to every location would be unlikely to work. It's also likely to suffer from excessive alarms - imagine what would happen if this system raised an alarm every time a passenger crossed over the yellow line walking along a platform. Right - it would get very quickly turned off (or ignored).
Training an AI to detect 'harassment' or 'random attacks' is entirely another ball game.
Oh, and this article is a wonderful example of bureaucratic justification. You could just read the original proposal in the article. It would start off by quoting statistics about trespassing and its 'costs'. It would then propose this solution to detect crossing level crossings against the lights or walking outside the yellow line. Absent would be any link between the types of incidents this system would detect and whether this is actually counted in the trespassing statistics. The proposal would finish up with a vague statement - which you can read in the article - about the system allowing Metro 'security' and 'staff' responding quicker to these situations. Absent would be any reality check - what does 'respond' mean? Even if the system works (which is dubious) how exactly will it reduce trespassing? By the time Metro 'security' and 'staff' get to a crossing the jay walkers would be long gone. Similarly on a station crossing the yellow line. Indeed, it's likely to simply show that crossing the yellow line occurs most often on excessively crowded platforms - i.e. it's Metro's responsibility.
Axle box
Beginner
Only thing I can see this being useful is for counting how many idiots ignore crossing equipment. Set it up at the Beach St pedestrian crossing at Frankston if they want good data. Over the course of a day you would have at least 20 people ignore the warnings and just open the emergency gate and walk on through. Time to upgrade the fences and gates at that location.
route14
Chief Commissioner
It probably is AI, which is in use in many large cities in China. It mightn't be programmed to identify jay walkers or people crossing beyond the yellow line, but is used to trace criminals such as pick-pockets and harassers.
bevans
Site Admin
Location: Melbourne, Australia
It probably is AI, which is in use in many large cities in China. It mightn't be programmed to identify jay walkers or people crossing beyond the yellow line, but is used to trace criminals such as pick-pockets and harassers.
The Chinese now have drones disguised as birds that fly around and record people in the street.
historian
Chief Commissioner
It probably is AI, which is in use in many large cities in China. It mightn't be programmed to identify jay walkers or people crossing beyond the yellow line, but is used to trace criminals such as pick-pockets and harassers.
The Chinese now have drones disguised as birds that fly around and record people in the street.
TBH, I suspect this is propoganda.
I mean, why would the Chinese authorities bother disguising drones as birds? They can put up as many cameras as they want, and can openly fly drones around anytime.
bevans
Site Admin
Location: Melbourne, Australia
TBH, I suspect this is propoganda.
I mean, why would the Chinese authorities bother disguising drones as birds? They can put up as many cameras as they want, and can openly fly drones around anytime.
https://www.dailymotion.com/video/x7u0ths#:~:text=It%20was%20another%20major%20milestone,Yes!
route14
Chief Commissioner
Chinese large cities have over a million surveillance cameras covering streets.
historian
Chief Commissioner
It probably is AI, which is in use in many large cities in China. It mightn't be programmed to identify jay walkers or people crossing beyond the yellow line, but is used to trace criminals such as pick-pockets and harassers.
That's not how it's used; that's how it's sold to the gullible politicians and public.
Facial recognition technology could, in theory, be used to identify suspects if you have good enough footage of the actual crime. That generally doesn't occur.
In practice it's used to identify people going about their ordinary activities in public spaces. The system raises an alert if it identifies someone flagged in the system. People could be flagged because they've been previously convicted of a crime, such as petty theft, or because they authorities thing they might commit a crime, or because they are a member of a group that the authorities think might commit a crime, or simply because the authorities want to track you. Once identified the person can be tracked, or a foot patrol can be sent to intercept the person.
There are at least two issues with this technology:
- It's subject to both false positives (misidentifying people) and false negatives (not indentifying people that it should). The failure rate of both in actual policing systems is unknown, but academic studies have shown that it is particularly high if the person being identified is significantly different to the training set. (i.e. in the US they are a person of colour.)
- The way it is used is not reactive - to identify a suspect who has committed a crime - but simply to harass a person that the authorities think might commit a crime. The dangers of this approach should be clear.
Valvegear
Oliver Bullied, CME
Location: Richmond Vic
If these cameras and lasers have been installed at Richmond ( as the article claims), it would be the world's most unobtrusive and silent project ever undertaken.
I live 40 metres from the Stewart Street entry/exit; I walk through the station with my son for our coffee on 4 or 5 mornings a week, and I use the train from there on most weekends. I have seen no sign whatsoever of any such work. I'd be curious to know when it is supposed to have been done.
I live 40 metres from the Stewart Street entry/exit; I walk through the station with my son for our coffee on 4 or 5 mornings a week, and I use the train from there on most weekends. I have seen no sign whatsoever of any such work. I'd be curious to know when it is supposed to have been done.
Lockie91
Assistant Commissioner
Location: Sunbury, Vic
If we can hold our wild conspiracy theories for just a second and actually read the article.
The software is all about passenger movements and behaviours. For example person A enters the station from point X and tops up myki, checks display boards, walks to the platform, and so on. This is essentially movement data and something that PTV/DoT should have been doing long ago.
How does the average commuter use the station, is there a pinch point, is one entrance more used than another; this all feeds into how new stations should be designed and existing stations modified to better manage increasing passenger numbers.
CCTV cameras are installed across the network already, the inner core would have thousands of them. This software just makes them 'smart'. The software identifies and gives a person a marker, it can then track you across the different cameras across the station essentially drawing a map of how you used the station. You layer the thousands of people that use a station every day and you can start to see movement trends as I've described above.
It's similar for level crossings, it can track how a person uses these and trespasses, giving data on how to prevent this from happening.
This kind of software is widely used around the world in metro systems and urban cities, we are just 20 years behind.
Lockie
The software is all about passenger movements and behaviours. For example person A enters the station from point X and tops up myki, checks display boards, walks to the platform, and so on. This is essentially movement data and something that PTV/DoT should have been doing long ago.
How does the average commuter use the station, is there a pinch point, is one entrance more used than another; this all feeds into how new stations should be designed and existing stations modified to better manage increasing passenger numbers.
CCTV cameras are installed across the network already, the inner core would have thousands of them. This software just makes them 'smart'. The software identifies and gives a person a marker, it can then track you across the different cameras across the station essentially drawing a map of how you used the station. You layer the thousands of people that use a station every day and you can start to see movement trends as I've described above.
It's similar for level crossings, it can track how a person uses these and trespasses, giving data on how to prevent this from happening.
This kind of software is widely used around the world in metro systems and urban cities, we are just 20 years behind.
Lockie
Madjikthise
Deputy Commissioner
"The new equipment being trialled will not be used to identify individuals"
Why? Is it illegal to identify someone doing something illegal?
I can tell you how people trespass at level crossings. A 4 foot fence, a bypass gate that can easily be opened with one finger, or a tiny boom gate that one can duck under. Fix those and most trespass goes away. Done. Where's my million dollar consultation fee?
Why? Is it illegal to identify someone doing something illegal?
I can tell you how people trespass at level crossings. A 4 foot fence, a bypass gate that can easily be opened with one finger, or a tiny boom gate that one can duck under. Fix those and most trespass goes away. Done. Where's my million dollar consultation fee?
railblogger
Chief Commissioner
Location: At the back of the train, quitely doing exactly what you'd expect.
Add lack of fencing along the rail corridor to that list and I'll write your a cheque.
Daryl
Junior Train Controller
Location: Carrum Downs
They can read the subcutaneous RFIDs that we all have to have.
bevans
Site Admin
Location: Melbourne, Australia
They can read the subcutaneous RFIDs that we all have to have.
Interesting concept.
YM-Mundrabilla
The Ghost of George Stephenson
Location: Mundrabilla but I'd rather be in Narvik
Does RFID = AEI?
WimbledonW
Assistant Commissioner
Location: Sydney
Does RFID = AEI?One of the advantages of electronically readable ticket is that they generate lots of statistics that help design train service frequencies and stopping patters. Thus "free public transport" is a bit counter productive.